Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Do you love God?

If you do then do you love others? It says in first John that if we love God we will have fellowship with one another.

That's funny, because when I hear most people talk about being close to God I hear people say they have some kind of great insight or they had an inspiring experience. They would be feeling really good about themselves. Is that the result of being with God? Feeling good for a little while?

John, though, says the result of having fellowship with God is loving others. It means loving broken people, hurt people, frustrating people, ugly people, and not just the people that are convenient to us. The Bible tells us to accept others as Christ has accepted you. Think about it. Christ accepted you as a sinner. You were someone who offended God, but he accepted you.

John says that if we have fellowship with God we will love others. I have to admit that I after a while I'll write people off. I grow tired of dealing with them. For me then that's a gut check (compassion in the Bible refers to your gut). I have to ask myself in that situation if I really have fellowship with God, because if did, I would love you no matter what.